


television dreams of yesterday

by TheOtherBookwormFanperson



Category: American Idiot - Green Day/Armstrong
Genre: F/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-27
Updated: 2018-03-31
Packaged: 2019-03-27 07:55:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,466
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13876533
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheOtherBookwormFanperson/pseuds/TheOtherBookwormFanperson
Summary: a series of momentsjohnny pov





	1. it's better way back when

**Author's Note:**

> this is definitely not me projecting and trying to figure things out from my canon haha

1\. You all had a crush on her. She was the new girl, the one you didn't know. She sat in front of Tunny in his third period class, the one you all used to skip (your Health class was boring anyway, and Will never cared a day in his life about PE.) Now Tunny stayed in History class, and neither of you saw him until lunch.

"She asked me for a pencil today," Tunny confided in you two.

"Did she do that one smile?" Will asked, trying to play it off as disinterested.

"Next thing you know, she'll be asking for some di-," you start to say, before Will throws a stray pebble at your head. You throw it back at him, and before it can escalate into a war, Tunny intercepts the speeding rock and starts tossing it up and down, catching it each time.

"Shut  _up_ , oh my god," Will says, resorting to kicking you under the table. You grab your leg, moaning as if you'd been killed.

"Betrayed, by my own best friend! Et tu, William?"

"Guys, she's  _right there_ ," Tunny points out. You all turn and stare.

She is, talking to Gloria a table over.

"Didn't Gloria have a girlfriend last year?" you observe.

"Didn't you have a dick last year?" Tunny shoots back teasingly.

"I still have one, dumbass. Want me to prove it?"

Honestly, as your bantering continues, you wonder if talking to the new girl- Heather- would ever feel so natural. You can't imagine being separated from the others, and you're sure they feel the same.


	2. walking on water away

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> is this my life?

2\. Everything bad that's ever happened has been right here in Jingletown, you're absolutely sure.

Your father left after a whole life here, Will's sister died here, Tunny broke his leg here. It's like the town is cursed.

"It's like the town is cursed," you say.

"So? Just 'cuz everything bad that's happened to us was here doesn't mean shit, shitbag," Tunny responds in the dark, his tapping fingers on the bedsheets outlined by a distant street light through the window. "We've never gone anywhere else."

"I mean, what about that field trip to Oakland?" Will says. You all fall silent for a minute, remembering. An airplane takes off a few miles away and its dull roar filters through Will's house's walls.

"That was cool, though. Nothing bad happened," you dismiss when it passes out of earshot.

"Heather almost got hit by a car," Will says defensively.

"She was like ten feet away from it, dude," Tunny points out. "How do you remember that, anyways? It was like, last year."

"It  _was_ last year," you confirm.

"Whatever." Will falls silent, losing the thread of the conversation.

Later, you think about how Gloria had a girlfriend two years ago. You can't remember her name. She moved away after a few months.

You think about how much Will and Tunny have been hurt here.

"What if we had wings?" Tunny says out of nowhere, swinging his legs against the bed frame.

"I dunno. We'd probably end up like Icarus," Will shrugs.

"Icarus was an idiot, man, he tried to fly into the sun! We're not that dumb," Tunny says.

"If we had wings, I'd want to fly the fuck out of here," you say.

"That's a good idea," Will says. "Just flying out."

You remember this conversation a month later, when you're sick. You'd called up Will and Tunny and were trying to hang out as usual, although you kept having to go vomit in the bathroom. During a break from the grossness, though, you all make a mutual promise that when everyone's better, you'd go flying out of there together.

You don't mention the fact that last week, when your mom was passed out on the couch, you impulsively jumped on your bike and started riding away without a thought in your head except to  _get out,_ to  _leave_ and  _start over_. You don't mention that you got all the way to the train station six miles away from your home before realizing you hadn't brought any clothes or anything, not even money for a train ticket. You don't mention that you forgot, just for a little bit, that you had friends over the messy  _need for change and escape and--_

_And--_

You don't know. You don't say a thing. You just link pinkies and cross your heart in tandem with each other before you feel something burning in your throat and need to fly away again for just a minute.


	3. sidewalk city shadows

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the consequences of leaving your best friend behind

You swing your legs on the bench by the station exit, trying to blot out the noise in your brain and fill it instead with the feeling of a whole new world of unfamiliar buildings and foreign shadows and mystery streets.

"What if we never see him again?" Tunny asks.

You put on a facade of certainty. "Who, that shitbag? He left us first, okay? He's the one who turned back on us." You uncomfortably ignore the harsh voice in your head reminding you that the last time you saw Will, he was staring as you resolutely boarded the bus with your guitar banging around your legs, Tunny trailing behind. That he was still clutching his bus ticket in the hand Heather wasn't holding. That you looked away first.

"His kid's gonna be... something," Tunny says to fill the silence, not quite acknowledging your false bravado. "If he doesn't drop it down the stairs or anything, that is."

"What, Will? Drop a baby?" You scoff. "He's the one who worries over you walking  _anywhere_ ever since you broke your leg in junior high."

"I guess you're right." Tunny shrugs with one shoulder and starts swinging his legs off the beat of yours. It's like some sort of Newton's Basket, or whatever it's called.

"Cradle," Tunny says. You look at him. You hadn't realized you'd muttered that aloud. "Newton's Cradle, that thing with the pendulums swinging back and forth and hitting each other."

"Oh, right," you say. "Anyway," you revert back to the original topic, unsure what else to say, "He's a big boy, he'll be fine. In the meantime," you grab Tunny's hand and check his watch, "where do we go?"

As Tunny reclaims his arm, you suddenly remember that for all the daydreaming and enthusing you and Tunny had done about your future dream lives, away from Jingletown once and for all, neither of you knew anything about this place. Of course, you'd been here before a time or two on school trips, and heard a lot about all that happened in the city, but it was hard to tell between fact and folklore. Ghost stories and suicides and classmates' older brothers' friends' cousins on drugs, or something. Neither you nor Tunny knew anything very concrete about the place, but Will had had notes on how to find apartments and shit for cheap here, he'd done research. He knew where the nearest and cheapest motels would be to the stop they got off at. You look at Tunny with the realization and see the same thoughts dawning on his face.

"Well, shit." Tunny stops swinging his legs and bites at his nails.

"Shit," you agree, thinking how stupid it was of you to bring nothing but a guitar, a change of clothes, and some cash.

The two of you spend the night in a homeless shelter, which you guess you are now. Homeless. The word rings emptily through your head. You and Tunny make plans to find a payphone and call Will's house to see if he can help at all in the morning. The shelter beds suck, and you both sleep fitfully, tossing and turning. When you wake up, you have no idea where you are for a minute. After breakfast, Tunny says, "I think there was something important we were gonna do."

"What could be more important than this?" you ask, spreading your arms around you and assuming an expression of complete satisfaction with your position in life. "We've done it, Tun. We're in the city, and we're never going back to Jingletown again."

"You know what? You're right," Tunny says, wiping the last of the sleep from his eyes and checking his bag to make sure he still had everything.

"Gimme sidewalk city shadows!" You insist, spinning to face the city as a whole as if demanding your new life from it.

"My own private war," Tunny adds, coming up next to you and mock-saluting.

"Rally the troops!"

You and Tunny spend another couple of minutes spitting lines of mismatched mixed-up words to each other, and then march out of the shelter together, ready to find a place to stay for real. You ignore how empty the space at your other shoulder feels, and focus on the house-hunting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> feel free to leave a comment w/ your ai headcanons and how your day is going


End file.
